


for every name that's been erased (let's have another round)

by thenewbacklog



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Post-Battle of Yavin, Post-Rogue One, Rogue Squadron (Star Wars)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-01
Updated: 2019-12-01
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:06:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21628069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thenewbacklog/pseuds/thenewbacklog
Summary: Wedge, Luke, Hobbie, and Wes in the months after Yavin, and how the Rogues might have gotten their name, in another galaxy.
Relationships: Biggs Darklighter & Luke Skywalker, Biggs Darklighter/Luke Skywalker (past), Wedge Antilles & Biggs Darklighter, Wedge Antilles & Derek "Hobbie" Klivian, Wedge Antilles & Luke Skywalker, Wedge Antilles & Wes Janson
Comments: 2
Kudos: 35





	for every name that's been erased (let's have another round)

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in the weeks after Rogue One came out, edited it today, and decided to just go ahead and post it. It’s long since been jossed by the comics and their neat explanation for how the gang rises in the chain of command so quickly, so consider this a mild AU that pulls from Legends, canon as of December 2016, and my own imagination. It’s a big, self-contradictory galaxy we’ve got here.

After the Death Star, they’d rebuilt Red Squadron quickly – they had to. The Alliance lost almost all of Red Squadron and most of Blue and Gold at Yavin and Scarif, and they couldn’t get by with so few pilots. After Yavin, Commander Narra had asked Wedge and Luke to stay in Red Squadron for now, with a growing list of new pilots to make up for everyone they’d lost. Wedge spent what little free time he had in the hangar, making minor repairs his X-wing didn’t really need and trying not to think about everyone who should have been there. Sometimes he could almost see them – there was Val sitting on a crate near Evaan, snagging bites from her lunch when she thought she could get away with it. There were Biggs and Nozzo making stupid jokes over by Hobbie. But everyone had moved on. New people had their callsigns, new faces who didn’t know why the old guard (“old guard,” _honestly_, he was twenty-kriffing-one) sometimes faltered before comming them during drills, although the older or more perceptive ones figured it out quick.

What choice did they have? There was a war on.

The Alliance was full of folks who lost families and friends, sole survivors from missions, beings who had lost their entire world to the Empire. You had to learn how to keep moving even when it felt like you couldn’t. He’d seen, they’d all seen, what happened if you didn’t.

He’d been spending a lot more time with Hobbie, Wes, and Luke, lately. It helped. Luke and Biggs had grown up together, and Wedge didn’t know exactly what they’d had, but he knew there’d been something. Hobbie had helped Biggs defect. He and Wes had been friends with Jek, too, before Luke showed up with the Death Star plans and enough puppyish enthusiasm to make even the younger pilots feel old. Before Jek and Biggs and so many others had died.

One evening after they evacuated Yavin, the four of them huddled together on Luke’s bunk, pressed close against the cold and passing Wes' flask back and forth. Luke and Wedge had been asked to lead a new flight with Luke in command, Wedge as second, and Hobbie and Wes to round it out. They'd gotten together to try and come up with a name, but after a few hours, they were somehow farther from one than when they’d started, especially after Wes had left to use the fresher and taken a detour on the way back to get his flask.

After the sixth pun that _definitely_ wouldn’t fly (ha) with Narra, Luke, who’d apparently never had anything approaching booze back on that dustball, groaned in frustration, slumped against Wedge, and nearly dropped the flask before Hobbie caught it.

“I can’t _believe_ this, they wanna put me in charge of a flight, and I can’t even figure out what to call one.” Luke shifted, like he wanted to throw up his hands and pace, but changed his mind on realizing he’d have to get up.

“I haven’t named anything except my T-16 back home, and when I told Biggs about it he laughed at me.” Luke flopped sideways onto Wedge’s lap.

The other three pilots looked around the room, as though someone would tell them what to do if they waited long enough. Emotional deftness had vanished about an hour ago. Wedge wrapped an arm over Luke where he lay across his lap, and Luke relaxed a little.

“What’d you name the T-16?” Hobbie finally asked.

Luke mumbled something that sounded a lot like “Darklighter,” and the room went quiet. They all remembered hearing Biggs talk about this loud-mouthed boy who’d give you his whole heart if you let him, and who apparently stayed home the day they handed out subtlety.

Biggs Darklighter. He was one hell of a friend. Wedge still remembered the day he showed up at the freighter where Biggs and Jek were working, fresh from the high of successfully convincing command that he could still be a pilot, could find some way to help until his leg healed, just as long as he stayed on a ship. By the time he’d been deemed ready to return to the Starfighter Corps, command was so impressed with how the three of them worked together that they’d sent Biggs and Jek to Red Squadron, too. Their little trio had stayed together after all.

Now he was the only one left.

Sometimes, if he didn’t think too hard, it was like they weren’t even gone, like if he just walked into the hangar at the right time he’d see Biggs, and Jek, and Branon and Zal and Nozzo and the baby-faced guy who’d been Red Five before Luke, the one who smuggled people away from the Empire before he joined up.

Wedge propped his chin on one hand, leaning his elbow on Luke, who looked like he’d settled in Wedge’s lap for the duration. He thought of sacrifices made and friends lost, of old jokes and the ugly mustache that had been Surrel’s pride and joy. The day Surrel finally declared it finished, Zal shook her head and said there were plenty of rodents on base already without another one living on his face. No one let Surrel live that one down for weeks.

He thought of giving the announcement to the pilots, sending them to Scarif, praying the Force would be with his friends when he couldn’t be.

He thought of how silent Wes and Hobbie had been after Jek died. The way Luke had dimmed a little, not quite the human ball of sunshine Biggs had described.

He thought of improvised plans and desperate missions. Of writing yourself off to give someone a chance.

Of the people who’d saved them all as much as Luke’s lucky shot had, with a lot less of the glory. Of a fellow defector.

And then he had it.

“How about Rogue Flight?”


End file.
